Bebop Roulette
by SolidKZ
Summary: Faye, Jet and Spike deal with the Bebop and each other as the ship plunges into an Asteroid field.


Cowboy Bebop - Bebop Roulette  
A Fanfiction/Short Story  
by Mike Barranti  
27 Nov 2001  
  
The ashtray on the table was virtually overflowing with the dusty gray ash of the several dozen cigarettes that sat dormant or smoldering in the middle of it. The low hum of an air conditioner echoed through the hallways and the large living room, its lonely whine signifying its struggle to continue to cycle the stale gray smoke through the air filters as it uselessly pumped clean air into the room. The gray-brown haze that seemed to permeate the atmosphere moved very slowly through the vent, only to be replaced by the occasional puff of exhaled cigarette smoke coming from the three bodies that sat on three sides of the table in the middle of the room.   
  
Sitting on opposite sides of the table, the craggy, older Jet Black and the younger, stoney eyed Spike Spiegel traded shots of exhaled smoke towards one another. The elder Jet only looked at his counterpart when he took the time to spew a stream of gray smoke towards the younger, with the occasional flick of his cigarette into the ashtray that sat between them. Spike on the other hand, with a self-assured smirk on his face, sat like a statue, staring at his older partner, moving only to raise his cigarette to his lips long enough to take a deep drag from it and then to lower it again, holding it constantly just above the overflowing ashtray.   
  
Sitting nervously in the odd chair at the table, the tag-along temptress, part time gambler and full-time houseguest, Faye Valentine shifted repeatedly in her seat, her worried gaze shifting from Spike to Jet and back again before she too took a long and anxious hit from her own cigarette. As her red scarf slipped down her arm, she moved yet again to replace it on her shoulder. The imaginary ticking of a nonexistant clock rattled through her head and she raised a hand to wipe her brow. She looked from one to the other again and finally sat up.  
  
"Spike?" she needled hesitantly, an air of worry in her voice.  
  
The expressionless face of her intended target didn't change, nor did his posture. He simply shifted his eyes towards Faye, then back to Jet as he grunted his disapproval.  
  
"Jet?" asked Faye, her head turning towards her other companion.  
  
Jet only turned his balding head a little more towards the ceiling as he replied, "uh-uh."  
  
Faye took another drag from her cigarette, the burning ember at its tip glowing bright red for a moment as she did. As the cigarette burned down to its filter, she exhaled the last drag and then leaned over the table, stubbing out the remains into the gray mountain of ash and butts in the tray. She leaned back and looked from one then to the other and said, "Guys, come on..." but to no avail. Neither of her companions paid her any mind.  
  
The Bebop shook violently for a moment, her old hull creaking and straining internally from the impact of a small meteor. The noise echoed through the ship, the contents shaking. On the table, the mountain of spent cigarettes and ash shuddered and scattered over the center of the table.  
  
Faye grasped the arms of her chair and stared up at the ceiling, which was still vibrating from the sound that had moments ago rattled the entire ship. A little more urgently this time, she leaned forward and shouted at her shipmates, "Hey!" She sat near the edge of her chair, shouting at both of them, "We're going to be killed, would one of you apologize?!"  
  
Neither of them moved, except to puff on their respective cigarettes, each exhaling at the other.  
  
Faye pulled out another of her long, thin cigarettes and fumbled around in her pocket for her lighter. Upon finding it, she held it to the tip of her cigarette and flicked it. The first try did not catch, nor did the second or third tries. Finally on the fourth try, it lit, the edge of the blue-yellow flame catching the very edge of the crisp paper. Almost at that same moment, the Bebop shook again, a second meteor striking its already worn hull. The jolt shook Faye enough that she mis-timed her light and managed to catch a sidestream of the acrid smoke in her eye. Almost instantly, her right eye began to tear up, the annoyance and embaressment far surpassing the stinging sensation that now registered in her brain. Almost instantly, she breathed out and held her cigarette and her lighter at arms' length and closed her now wet eye.   
  
"Dammit, guys!" she cried out, taking a moment to cough from the unexpected smoke caught up in her throat. "Enough is enough, would you get over it?"  
  
Finally, Spike spoke up. With a semblance of a smirk, he remarked to his female companion, "What's the matter, can't smoke when your life is in jeopardy?"  
  
Without thinking, Faye replied, "I suck at Jeopardy!" much to the confusion of her associates. She tucked her lighter away and took a long, nervous drag, scooting back into the cushion of her chair.  
  
"What?" asked Spike, the allusion falling on uninformed ears. He turned his gaze for a moment at the now confused looking Faye, a question forming on the tip of his tongue. Before he could ask, however, another Meteor struck the Bebop, shaking it much worse than before.  
  
Faye grasped the edge of her seat before the shaking even finished and in a panicked voice whispered, "I'll take 'Oh Shit' for Five Hundred, Alex."   
  
This time both Spike and Jet turned to stare at her, each looking at her long enough for her to get her own joke. Nervous laughter overtook her and she settled further back into her chair, breathing rather rapidly as she began to shake, her free hand grasping the arm of the chair almost tightly enough to rip the fabric.  
  
Shaking their respective heads, Spike and Jet shrugged off the woman's delusional ravings and turned back towards each other, their eyes both full of slightly softened anger and fierce accusation. Each one simultaneously stabbed out their cigarette, and like a pair of synchonized swimmers, pulled a new one from each of their respective packs, raised them to their lips and then lit them.   
  
As her nervous laughter subsided, Faye sat up straight and growled at both of them, "This isn't funny anymore. Do you want to get us killed?"   
  
Almost as if to punctuate that fact, Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivrusky the 4th came running up through the hallway, her Tomato boxed computer held high over her head, screaming in her usual enthusiastic and worryfree voice, "We're all gonna die, All gonna die, Woo-ooh." She ran through the living room, circled the trio twice, shouting the whole time. She then ran up the stairs and through the sealed door leading to the revolving hallway beyond. Moments later, the Welsh Corgi data-dog Ein ran through, yipping at the top of his lungs, following Ed's path to the letter, then disappearing into the revolving hallway, the circular door closing behind him and muting out his and the young girl's voices.  
  
Dumbfounded, Faye grabbed Spike's arm and shouted at him, "Apologize already!" When he didn't respond, she moved her hand to Jet's shoulder and shook him. "Jet! Come on!"   
  
Several minutes passed, each of the three smoking down another full cigarette and in turn pulling out another to light up.   
  
The shrill, penetrating whine of the Bebop's imminent collision alarm began to pour over the speakers in the living room. Faye bolted to her feet and shouted at her partners, "Dammit, do something! Say something! Gyaaah... I can't believe you guys."   
  
After a few moments, the alarm began to get louder and more rapid. Finally, Jet sprung to his feet, then flicked the remaining portion of his cigarette at his friend, then bolted up the stairs to the command deck, shouting, "Goddamn it, Spike!" before he disappeared from view.  
  
As the alarm died out, the floor of the Bebop pitched slightly, the artificial gravity adjusting to compensate for the sharp turn and the new course that Jet had put the ship on. Spike stared down at the cigarette in his mouth, wrinkling his nose and shifting his lips, causing the filter that had landed on his upper lip to fall to the side, dropping from his face like a leaf from a tree. His own cigarette tilted upwards slightly and his confused eyes moved out to the tip of his smoke, then to Faye.  
  
Faye was standing over him angrily, her wrists resting on her hips, her eyes narrowed and her cigarette smoke spraying at Spike in a deliberate stream. "Now that we're not about to die anymore," she asked, pausing to take another drag. "What was that all about?"  
  
Spike shook his head, "Jet's crazy if he thinks I wouldn't notice that he finished my Jim Beam."  
  
Faye stood up, looking dumbfounded for a moment, "Is that all? Is that what you were playing Russian Roulette with our lives about? That stupid bottle of Bourbon? I drank the last of it!"  
  
Spike stabbed out his cigarette and muttered, "It was my last bottle. I can't get another until we go back to Mars." He turned an angry glare towards Faye, who suddenly started backing up towards the door. "You mean to tell me YOU drank the last of it?"  
  
Faye started to wave her hands back and forth in front of her face, "Er, no, what I meant was... er, the last time I had that was... um..." Her yellow leather clad bottom bumped against the circular doorway and she suddenly turned and opened it, then bolted out into the revolving hallway beyond it.  
  
The door rolled closed slowly and Spike shook his head. He reached into his pack and stabbed for a cigarette. Glancing down, he noticed that the pack was itself empty. He shook his head again and leaned back on the sofa with a disappointed sigh. "Damn..."  
  
End 


End file.
